Jump to content

Menu

I don't understand "stocking stuffers"


poppy
 Share

Recommended Posts

When I was a kid, we got oranges, bananas, and nuts in our stocking, along with a small amount of candy; we never got actual gift-type stuff in there.  I tried to do that with my kids when they were old enough to get a stocking and they looked at me like I was crazy.  I continued it for a few years thinking they would latch onto the idea of fruit and nuts, but they never did, so now I am trapped in expensive stocking stuffer land.

:lol: 

 

The first Christmas I lived with my father & stepmother, I was shocked to discover my stocking was filled with fruit & nuts. I thought it was a joke at first, and kept waiting for someone to bring out the real stockings! I can understand putting in things like PopTarts, sugary cereals, a special soda, or other treats that parents wouldn't normally buy, but I was totally flummoxed by the idea of just emptying the fruit bowl into a Christmas stocking!

Edited by Corraleno
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

:lol: 

 

The first Christmas I lived with my father & stepmother, I was shocked to discover my stocking was filled with fruit & nuts. I thought it was a joke at first, and kept waiting for someone to bring out the real stockings! I can understand putting in things like PopTarts, sugary cereals, a special soda, or other treats that parents wouldn't normally buy, but I was totally flummoxed by the idea of just emptying the fruit bowl into a Christmas stocking!

 

I've always assumed that it is a tradition left over from when (in Europe) oranges and exotic nuts (like brazils) were expensive once-a-year items.  Even domestic nuts take a lot of gathering and might have been expensive.  I remember the orange in the toe of the stocking being special when I was small.  I suspect that they were expensive in the mid-sixties, only ten years after rationing ended in the UK.

 

  • Like 6
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've always assumed that it is a tradition left over from when (in Europe) oranges and exotic nuts (like brazils) were expensive once-a-year items.  Even domestic nuts take a lot of gathering and might have been expensive.  I remember the orange in the toe of the stocking being special when I was small.  I suspect that they were expensive in the mid-sixties, only ten years after rationing ended in the UK.

Oh I'm sure that's where it comes from. I'd imagine oranges were probably pretty exotic/expensive in the northeastern US during the Depression (when my parents were born), too. But as a kid I'd never heard of that, and I was used to toys and candy in my stocking, so I was sitting there on Christmas morning wondering what the heck is the point of taking oranges out of the kitchen fruit bowl and walnuts out of the bowl on the coffee table, and sticking them in a Christmas stocking? And how is that a "treat"???  :blink:

 

I still think that's a bit weird, and I never put "everyday" type things (like fruit or toothpaste or deodorant) in stockings. But I understand that for some people stockings are more of a low-key, traditional/ritual thing, more like decorating the tree or sending Christmas cards, versus serving as a package for lots of special treats and presents. For us, stockings are often a bigger deal than the presents, since the kids often know what their "big" presents are, and now that they're teens the big presents are often practical (clothes, shoes, sports equipment, etc.), so the surprise presents often end up in the stockings, along with yummy treats like imported Japanese candies and soda, Dutch licorice, Hob Nobs and Tim Tams, and good chocolates. (Our stockings are HUGE — more than 2' long, a foot in circumference, and stretchy!)

  • Like 5
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh I'm sure that's where it comes from. I'd imagine oranges were probably pretty exotic/expensive in the northeastern US during the Depression (when my parents were born), too. But as a kid I'd never heard of that, and I was used to toys and candy in my stocking, so I was sitting there on Christmas morning wondering what the heck is the point of taking oranges out of the kitchen fruit bowl and walnuts out of the bowl on the coffee table, and sticking them in a Christmas stocking? And how is that a "treat"??? :blink:

 

I still think that's a bit weird, and I never put "everyday" type things (like fruit or toothpaste or deodorant) in stockings. But I understand that for some people stockings are more of a low-key, traditional/ritual thing, more like decorating the tree or sending Christmas cards, versus serving as a package for lots of special treats and presents. For us, stockings are often a bigger deal than the presents, since the kids often know what their "big" presents are, and now that they're teens the big presents are often practical (clothes, shoes, sports equipment, etc.), so the surprise presents often end up in the stockings, along with yummy treats like imported Japanese candies and soda, Dutch licorice, Hob Nobs and Tim Tams, and good chocolates. (Our stockings are HUGE — more than 2' long, a foot in circumference, and stretchy!)

 

I think you hit the nail on the head by saying that for some, stockings are a low-key, ritual part of Christmas.

 

Also, it's all in what one grows up with. :-)

 

We are as over-the-top as one can very well be with Christmas as a whole. There are special foods the kids look forward to all year, and lots of candy of lots of sorts, and a veritable mountain of presents. Christmas dinner requires at least two days of cooking, and if I half-heartedly suggest varying our traditional menu the kids raise howls of protest.

 

So, we're not the least bit Scrooge-like.

 

But I grew up with family for whom the big boxes of citrus fruits delivered for Christmas were a big, huge treat. Again, Depression-era parents, and grandparents born in the nineteenth century. Even in his eighties, my father would bring a crate of clementines as a part of his generous Christmas gift for us.

 

So this is what my girls have grown up with. The stocking is a small, traditional part of an overflowing cornucopia of Christmas plenty. And, it's mostly filled with candy. But the orange, apple and nuts remind me and, I hope, them as well of family and Christmases past.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have an internally inconsistent view.

 

I think a small-but-expensive present can totally be a stocking stuffer.

 

I think that marketing something small-but-expensive as a stocking stuffer is intentional trivialization, designed to make the buyer feel that they need to get something else as the "real" present.

 

I kind of feel this way too.  Like the idea is fine but the commercial interests want to up the game as much as possible.

 

But looking at how Christmas has changed over the past 100 years, it's difficult for me not to see that as a hard fact.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've always assumed that it is a tradition left over from when (in Europe) oranges and exotic nuts (like brazils) were expensive once-a-year items.  Even domestic nuts take a lot of gathering and might have been expensive.  I remember the orange in the toe of the stocking being special when I was small.  I suspect that they were expensive in the mid-sixties, only ten years after rationing ended in the UK.

 

When we were kids that's what the stockings from the Moose or VFW were filled with.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Growing up, my stockings included:

an orange and an apple in the toe

assorted nuts (including Brazil nuts which are a pain to crack for a kid, LOL)

a small baggie of gumdrops or hard candy

small amount of chocolate

 

 

I fill my kids' stockings with:  any cool and fairly inexpensive candy and stuff that I happen to stumble upon. I admit to getting carried away this year.

 

Saw a awesome Facebook post about filling stockings with ready-to-eat, self-serve breakfast items.  Donuts, cereal, bars, fruit, nuts, applesauce, squeeze yogurt, juice boxes.  Then when the kids wake up, they can tear into their stockings and not wake mom and dad so early. :D

Edited by alisoncooks
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Seeing it as an adult now, I think it was probably started by my parents' families during the Depression because those things were at that time a luxury.  I was that weird kid that liked getting fruit and nuts, LOL.

:lol: 
 
The first Christmas I lived with my father & stepmother, I was shocked to discover my stocking was filled with fruit & nuts. I thought it was a joke at first, and kept waiting for someone to bring out the real stockings! I can understand putting in things like PopTarts, sugary cereals, a special soda, or other treats that parents wouldn't normally buy, but I was totally flummoxed by the idea of just emptying the fruit bowl into a Christmas stocking!

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yup - I grew up in the 60s in the northeastern US, so I probably inherited by love of oranges and nuts in the stocking from that.  :)

Oh I'm sure that's where it comes from. I'd imagine oranges were probably pretty exotic/expensive in the northeastern US during the Depression (when my parents were born), too. But as a kid I'd never heard of that, and I was used to toys and candy in my stocking, so I was sitting there on Christmas morning wondering what the heck is the point of taking oranges out of the kitchen fruit bowl and walnuts out of the bowl on the coffee table, and sticking them in a Christmas stocking? And how is that a "treat"???  :blink:
 
I still think that's a bit weird, and I never put "everyday" type things (like fruit or toothpaste or deodorant) in stockings. But I understand that for some people stockings are more of a low-key, traditional/ritual thing, more like decorating the tree or sending Christmas cards, versus serving as a package for lots of special treats and presents. For us, stockings are often a bigger deal than the presents, since the kids often know what their "big" presents are, and now that they're teens the big presents are often practical (clothes, shoes, sports equipment, etc.), so the surprise presents often end up in the stockings, along with yummy treats like imported Japanese candies and soda, Dutch licorice, Hob Nobs and Tim Tams, and good chocolates. (Our stockings are HUGE — more than 2' long, a foot in circumference, and stretchy!)

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...